


Dipped inside my white heart and made it red

by Sweetchoerrylove (Sunflowerhanamaru)



Series: The moon dorm [1]
Category: LOONA (Korea Band)
Genre: And Jiwoo has a big crush on Yves, F/F, The girls all live together in a big young women pension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-16
Updated: 2018-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-23 22:46:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14342556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunflowerhanamaru/pseuds/Sweetchoerrylove
Summary: Jiwoo had moved in the third room when she’d arrived. It was a bit of an outlier, that room, a bit of a different atmosphere. Every room had its own, of course, but room three was a bit different and everyone agreed on it without being able to pinpoint what it meant exactly.Jiwoo had moved in when only one person had lived in it but they had been joined by two last girls pretty soon, making the Moon dorm finally full for the first time in almost four years.In room three were Jiwoo, Chaewon, Olivia and Sooyoung. Yves.





	Dipped inside my white heart and made it red

Jiwoo remembers the day she had sled the art school application to her parents. They’d been seated around the kitchen table, her little brothers had been fighting as always, kicking each other on the shin under the table, thinking no one noticed them. Her mother had took the sheet of paper, had scanned it, brows furrowed.

“That school is in Seoul,” She had said like maybe she thought Jiwoo hadn’t noted that little problem. Jiwoo had nodded.

“You’d have to move out,” Her father had said, “You’re only sixteen.”

“That’s what I want to do,” Jiwoo had answered, her heart beating to the rhythm of a hundred drums. He had looked at the expensive camera sitting next to Jiwoo’s right hand. The camera that was always sitting by her right hand when it wasn’t around her neck or in front of her face. Jiwoo had knew she had won.

 

Her mother had been the one to discover the dorm: one of their neighbours’ distant relative was in charge of that building, alright, more like a pension for young women. It consisted of dorms big enough for twelve persons and it was supervised by adults but the girls lived in relative autonomy. It was a bit far from Jiwoo’s school, sure, but could you really expect something else from Seoul? One of the dorm still had three beds free but it was a really rare opportunity and a decision to take quick, as they wouldn’t stay free much longer. Jiwoo had sent the application the very evening. She had received an answer half an hour later telling her she could move in as soon as she wanted. It had be signed Cho Haseul. Jiwoo remembers thinking maybe that Haseul was her neighbour’s relative, that famous adult responsible for the girl’s wellbeing.

 

“Relative autonomy”, Jiwoo sometimes thinks, was very much an euphemism. The reality was the dorm was populated with twelve girls from age sixteen to twenty-two who lived in codependency, with an old woman coming once every month to take an half hearted tour of the flat to be sure nothing was broken and to collect rents.  
The girls already had their habits when Jiwoo had moved in but it hadn’t been that hard to adapt; Jiwoo was known for her ability to make friends with every person she met, after all. She had bonded with every girl easily and more particularly with Jungeun who was her age and studied in the same school as her. The long subway rides from the dorm to the school and back had helped them create a quick friendship, despite them having no class in common, that with Jungeun studying singing.

Cho Haseul, contrary to Jiwoo’s belief, had been one of the girls living the Moon dorm and the unofficial leader of the group. Jiwoo had been unable to get anyone to tell her why Haseul lived here, exactly, and she had stopped trying to know after a while. Haseul was kind and warm and probably the reason the dorm hadn’t collapsed already; Jiwoo thought of her like a friendly ghost sometimes, someone who predated the dorm and would be here long after it stopped being lived in by gaggles of laughing girls.  
There were the inseparable friends too, Heejin and Hyunjin. Jiwoo had spent the first two months trying to surprise one in a room without the other and had failed every time. They’d been kind enough to let Jiwoo document their friendship in a photography documentary once and her teacher had praised her on its originality. Jiwoo had thanked him but she hadn’t been able to shake that impression that she had captured something too intimate to be seen by just anyone. Heejin and Hyunjin had loved the pictures, though, and they’d ordered a print of their favorite to hang in their room so maybe Jiwoo was the only one being weird about it.  
Those three shared a room with the youngest girl, Yeojin, who was just full of noises and energy and uncontrollable anger sometimes, who rolled in rooms and roared and kicked until someone stopped her activity and gave her the attention she craved. Haseul said it was normal, that it was what happened when someone had to raise themselves from a young age and Jiwoo, who had grown up in a loving family, never pressed for more.

In the second room with Jungeun was Vivi, who had arrived one day from Singapore and had never explained much about her situation. She talked few, words measured and rolling slow in her mouth. She did some singing and some modelling and some Yeojin hugging during crisis. Jiwoo always felt uneasy looking at her in the eyes so she often directed her her camera lens on her and Vivi always paused, gracious and smiling. No one was really sure of her age and no one bothered to ask.  
Jinsoul was positivity and beauty and lightheadedness in one person: something of a purebred competition dog that never really learned how to behave, with limbs too long to do anything else but dance. So dance she did, all over the dorm: jetés in the kitchen and splits in the bathroom and twerks in the middle of the living room that offended Haseul and made Yeojin squeak in delight.  
Jinsoul dancing almost always meant Yerim dancing, laugh high and moves dramatic to hide how talented she actually was. She’d take the hands of the nearest victim and would make her twirl too and the chosen girl would comply because no one would ever say no to Yerim, her sunny smile and her slightly desperate hunger for contact.

Jiwoo had moved in the third room when she’d arrived. It was a bit of an outlier, that room, a bit of a different atmosphere. Every room had its own, of course, but room three was a bit different and everyone agreed on it without being able to pinpoint what it meant exactly.

Jiwoo had moved in when only one person had lived in it but they had been joined by two last girls pretty soon, making the Moon dorm finally full for the first time in almost four years.

In room three were Jiwoo, Chaewon, Olivia and Sooyoung. Yves.

 

It had started the day Hyejoo had came back from school asking everyone to call her Olivia instead. Hyejoo had always been somewhat of a loner despite being alone in a dorm full of girls being kind of a difficult affair. She was sweet and shy and a little dark sometimes and one day she decided everyone should now call her Olivia. There was some twist in her voice, some begging that had tugged at Jiwoo’s heart’s strings. Not all the girls had heard it, though, and Jiwoo had seen Hyejoo (Olivia) wince when Yeojin had laughed at her request. Sooyoung had stepped in, then, had said _I think Olivia is a beautiful name_ had said _I’ll call you Olivia if you call me Yves_ and that had settled everything.

Jiwoo had searched ‘Yves’ on naver later that night, thinking maybe it would give her a hint, something to understand the girl better. What she had found had only confused her more so she had let it go. She had called Olivia Olivia and Yves Yves and everyone else had started to do it as well and they had never talked about it ever again.

 

Room three is kind of an outlier. Maybe it’s because of the girls inhabiting it; maybe it’s because of its decoration. Jiwoo remembers that night Chaewon had woke up in the middle of the night and had started shaking with a full bodied panic attack after meeting the eyes of Olivia’s wolf poster in front of her bed. Jiwoo had coaxed her out of her bed and into hers, facing her raw of silly pictures of the girls together instead of the menacing figure, and she had kept awake all night hugging Chaewon’s small form, even long after Chaewon had calmed down. Yves had went out first thing in the morning and when she’d come back, just in time for breakfast, it had been with a handful of butterfly stickers sheets she had given to Chaewon. 

“Here,” She had said, “You can decorate Olivia’s wolves with them so they look less menacing.”

Olivia had appeared from the kitchen, looking tiny and remorseful. “I’ll help you unnie,” She had said, taking some of the stickers. “I think it would look pretty on their ears.”

“Can we put some in a crown shape, like in that _snow_ filter?” Had asked Chaewon. Olivia had nodded. “Come on then, let’s go Olive,” She had taken Olivia’s hand in hers, the affectionate nickname slipping easy from her lips. She had been the one struggling the most with that new name at first, not because she wasn’t careful but because the strange sounds sometimes refused to come out of her mouth. It wasn’t the case anymore but she still called her Olive sometimes when she was sleepy or in a hurry or when she wanted to convey affection.

“They’re good for each other,” Had said Yves, watching Olivia stand on her tiptoes to stick a butterfly higher under Chaewon’s commandment. Jiwoo had teared her eyes from the two young girls to watch Yves, her peaceful profile, her hair ruffled from how fast she had walked to come to the dorm early enough to catch the youngest before they had to leave for school. Her heart had skipped a beat.

“You’re good for them,” She had said without thinking.

Yves was a mystery. The way Jiwoo’s heart sometimes did reckless things when watching her was an even bigger one.

 

You can’t live together for three years without initiating some kind of traditions; that’s what Haseul always says, anyway. They have the usuals, of course: they celebrate all birthdays together, even if it’s not always practical because so many of them were born around the same date and they do a special pre-Christmas party every years since some of them aren’t at the dorm for the actual day. They celebrate New Year by watching the sunrise over Seoul on the roof of the building with some of the other dorms’ girls. They eat expensive meat the first day of every month because it’s when the older girls get their pay.  
They celebrate every school break by letting the younger girls stay awake past their curfew and by gathering in the living room, all together.  
It always starts a big mess; Yeojin and Yerim especially excited by the prospect of _staying up late!_ high on the sugary drinks Vivi indulges them with and the junk food Haseul pretends not to see and the excitement of doing something a little illegal. They put music and giggle and force the others to dance with them, Jinsoul and Jungeun and Jiwoo joining easily, the others taking some much more time to get convinced. Olivia is the hardest to convince usually but she always gives up when Yves takes her hand pulls her up. It’s not that she doesn’t want to dance, Jiwoo realizes one day, it’s that Olivia seems to always wait for someone to explicitly show her they want her here, like she’s always afraid her presence is a little unwanted. Jiwoo is careful to always include Olivia in everything she does after she understands that and the smile Yves gives her when she notices her attitude is so warm she almost starts crying on the spot.

Invariably the evening ends with the youngest girls crashing around midnight, Yeojin and Yerim and Chaewon and Olivia sweetly curled up around each others on the floor, covered with soft blankets Vivi stripped from their beds. Yeojin kicks in her sleep at regular intervals, making Olivia growls (She almost really sounds like a wolf, Jiwoo noticed once.) but they never wake up until the sunshine disturb them and they look around the room, disoriented and half of the previous night totally forgotten.  
Once the youngest girls are asleep Jungeun always slips out of the room to collect beers from the fridge and passes them around. Haseul presses her lips in a thin line, always says _It’s the last time we drink here_ but she still takes her own when Vivi hands it to her. They all act like they don’t know Heejin and Hyunjin are too young for alcohol (Hyunjin is, out of them eight, the one who handles her alcohol the best anyway.). Vivi never drinks more than a quarter of her bottle before giving the rest to whoever has already finish hers’. She had drank her beer fully once and Jiwoo remembers that night as the only time she heard Vivi say more than three sentences at once.

It’s the phase they are now, maknaes a peaceful puppy pile on the ground, Haseul, Vivi, Jungeun and Jinsoul mushed together on the biggest couch, Heejin and Hyunjin on the ground with their legs intertwined and Yves and Jiwoo on the smaller couch. Jiwoo had been careful to leave some space between them (Jiwoo is always hyper aware of the space between them lately. She’d started measuring the space she leaves between herself and her other friends to carefully leave the exact same number of centimeters between Yves and herself with a rigid fervor.) but at some point Yves had pulled a folded blanket from the mall next to her and had thrown it on Jiwoo’s body before sliding closer.

“You looked cold,” She whispers in Jiwoo’s ear, tilting her beer bottle in her direction. Jiwoo feels her cheeks heating up.

“Did I?” She asks just as softly. She hadn’t noticed but she does think she’s shivering now. She often shivers when Yves is around. Yves nods slowly.

“You still does,” She says gently. She changes her beer bottle from her right to her left hand and the now free hand comes to hold Jiwoo’s under the blanket. Haseul is whining about her boss somewhere in the background, far far far from where Jiwoo is now (In the clouds, in another dimension, in heaven.). Yves’ hand is cold and damp from the condensation of the beer but Jiwoo still feels warmer.

“I’m better now,” Their shoulders are gently touching under the blanket and what little skin she touches there is soft and warm. Yves’ eyes are as well. “You’re good at that.”

“Being a personal heater?” Yves asks, her eyes a sweet curve.

“Taking care of people,” Jiwoo says. “I wish you’d let people take care of you as well sometimes.”

Yves looks stunned for half a second. Jiwoo can make up the light chatter of Jinsoul and Hyunjin talking about their next dance lesson and the soft glow of Yves’ skin. Jiwoo wishes she could photography her. “Take care of me, Jiwoo-yah,” She says, laying her head on Jiwoo’s shoulder. Jiwoo doesn’t dare moving for the rest of the night.

 

The dorm is rarely calm and it’s the reason Jiwoo prefers to do her homeworks at night. The light is never ideal but it’s easier to focus on the pictures to touch up when there isn’t a girl hanging upside down next to her on the couch and peering at the screen or the sound of a fight about what to eat or who’s turn it is to shower or what time to go to sleep that night.

Jiwoo rubs the sleep out of her eyes impatiently. Their teacher had promised they would throw a mini exhibition that year and had just given them their theme, the extraordinary in ordinary. Jiwoo had knew immediately she’d use the opportunity to document the life at the dorm, to try to show the secret world of the girls living together. The dorm has always existed in a different realm from the the rest of Jiwoo’s life, a parallel reality she cherishes very much. She tried taking a serie of mock ups with Vivi has her model, pictures of the messy rooms with Vivi’s moving silhouette blurry in the middle. Vivi really looks like a fairy with her newly dyed pink hair and the vaporous white dress she’s wearing but Jiwoo knows something is missing and that knowledge makes her restless, frustrated.

There’s the quiet clatter of a mug being put down next to Jiwoo’s laptop and Yves settling on the couch crossed-legs, her hands carefully wrapped around a second mug. The air fills with the sweet smell of one of Yves’ christmas teas, apples and almonds and spices, and Jiwoo’s heart warms up at the idea of Yves sharing some of her precious tea’s collection with her. She’s wearing a flannel pajama printed with strawberries, the too long sleeves covering half of her hands. There’s a running joke in the dorm about strawberries being Jiwoo in fruit form since that day she woke up in the middle of the night before a big project’s deadline and stress-ate the two dozen Hyunjin had bought for Yerim’s birthday cake. It’s just a joke, of course, but seeing Yves covered with something that’s jokingly called Jiwoo’s make her head spin a little, like Yves is Jiwoo’s as well now.

“How is the project going?” Yves asks between two sips. Jiwoo sighs and takes her own mug, blows on it slowly.

“I don’t know,” She admits. “I think my idea is good but there’s something off about those mock-ups.” Yves peers at the screen, eyes squinting in concentration. Yves does her fair share of squinting lately and Jiwoo finds herself waiting the day Haseul booked them all ophthalmological appointment with impatience, if only for the glorious sigh of Yves in glasses.

“Isn’t it off because Vivi is the model of all your pics?” She asks and Jiwoo has to tear her eyes away from Yves’ face before she gets caught staring. “Like this one,” She points at the screen. “Seeing Vivi in our room is just weird. What about mixing it with the opposite concept, too? I love that picture of Jungeun you did where everything is blurry except for her.”

“Yeah?” Jiwoo whispers in answer.

“Yeah. I mostly think you should take a break though. That project isn’t due before long, right? And you’ve been glued to your laptop all day.”

“But…”

“Take a break, Jiwoo-yah.” Yves unfolds her legs and puts her bare feet in Jiwoo’s lap. “Take care of me now.”

Jiwoo blushes hard. “What should I do?” Her hand squeezes Yves’ ankle and she lays her cheek on her knees.

“You’re doing just well,” Yves says, sounding a little strained. “Tell me about your day,”

The first word people use when prompted to describe Jiwoo is ‘loud’ and she knows it. Jungeun often teases her about her loud aura and how afraid she’d been at first of not getting along with her because of it. Jiwoo is a loud, reckless person, always ready to cause mischief with her younger friends. Yet there is something about Yves that makes her calm, quiet in a way she can’t quite understand. Yves reaches for her, slips her fingers in her hair, her nails scratching pleasantly at Jiwoo’s scalp. She rakes her brain for some kind of amusing anecdote to tell Yves and starts talking softly, her voice husky with exhaustion. Yves’ eyes are half closed as well, her expression relaxed and soft, her hair in a messy bun terribly soft looking. Her pajamas’ top is open just enough for Jiwoo to imagine a collarbone, to look at the sweet slope of her neck. Maybe she’s never wanted to take a picture more than she does now.

She wakes up to Yves laying her on the couch, covering her with a blanket. She faintly realizes Yves is the one taking care of her once again.

 

Yves is hovering next to entry door, her hair tied in a high ponytail and wearing her usual black leather jacket. She looks so beautiful Jiwoo’s heart aches. She stops, her hand on the door’s handle, and looks back at Jiwoo.

“I’m going to work,” She says, then pauses. “Wanna come with?”

The funny thing is that Jiwoo can count on the fingers of one hand the number of girls she’s seen outside of the dorm. There’s Jungeun, of course, Jinsoul and Hyunjin because she went to see them dance to an event once and Heejin because where Hyunjin is Heejin is as well and Yeojin because she’s her designated partner for grocery shopping. It sounds weird maybe after three years living together but going out to hang out with people you can just spend time with at home isn’t that exciting of a prospect when you constantly run on too little hours of sleep and too many hours of classes. Especially when you can get food delivered at home.

“Do I have time to change?” Jiwoo asks, already standing up from the couch. Yves looks at her watch.

“Yeah, we’ll take the bus.”

Jiwoo throws the closet’s doors open so quickly it makes Olivia looks up from her book in surprise. 

“Do you know where my pink skirt is?” She asks, head half buried in the pile of clothes. She hears Olivia hums.

“I think Jinsoul took it the other day, you should look in her room.”

“Damn Jinsoul, I don’t have the time,” Jiwoo whines, “The blue will do.” Olivia is looking curiously at her when she closes the closet, head tilted in confusion. Jiwoo blushes. “Yves asked me to come with her to work.”

“Oh,” Olivia says with a knowing smile. “Have fun unnie.”

The idea of seeing Yves outside the dorm is just a little nerve wrecking because Jiwoo is so used to see her in the dorm she somehow can’t totally accept the fact that Yves is a real person existing in the real word. Yves is a little dream person, Jiwoo’s personal fantasy, a magical being that shouldn’t be tainted by the real word’s ugliness, someone that can’t exist in Jiwoo’s sad realness. She’d been afraid Yves would lost her glow if she’d seen her in the dirty streets around the dorm but she’d been wrong: Yves is here, outside with her, and she’s the one making the street glow. She’s powerful enough to light up the whole world, Jiwoo realizes, and beautiful and kind and perfect and seeing her in the streets makes Jiwoo loves both a little more. Yves takes her hand to lead her at one point and she doesn’t let go until they reach their goal.

“You work here?” The café is a tiny cozy thing crowded with plants. Yves leads Jiwoo to the table next to the window.

“Twenty hours a week,” She answers, taking of her jacket. “Writing doesn’t pay enough.”

Jiwoo watches her disappear in the employees’ area and reappears with a dark red apron and a little sign with her name on it. It reads Yves, not Sooyoung, and it weirdly comforts Jiwoo, like it’s a sign her Yves really exists in the world. Like Yves really is one person, not a persona she pulls out for her dorm mates. She’s secretive, though, even more than Jiwoo could have imagined: she wonders how many girls at the dorm know Yves works in the café on top of her writing. It makes sense, of course: even if Yves is the best lyricist in the world (In all modesty, of course.) she still has to make a name for herself in the music industry. Jiwoo wonders why she never guessed Yves had a part-time job.

It’s easy to know when some of Yves’ lyrics get approved because she always comes home with takeaway for twelve and a large smile on her face. Yves’ lyrics had been picked for a semi famous girl group’s comeback once and the Moon dorm had held a big celebration and a count-down to the release of the music video, all the girls struggling to stay awake until midnight to watch it the second it dropped. Jiwoo, Chaewon, Yerim and Haseul had cried when the song had won a comeback trophy on a popular TV show. Jungeun had borrowed one of Jiwoo’s camera to film the whole scene for the girls that were out that night. The other girls had watched the video on a regular basis, crying with laughter, for at least a month after the event. The girls had even filmed a cover of the song with Jiwoo as the main vocal and had gifted it to Yves on her following birthday.

 

The little carillon chimes when a customer enters the café and it serves as a call out for Jiwoo to stop staring and finally takes her laptop out from her bag. It’s easier to work here, quiet but for the discreet chatter of Yves’ patrons. She can’t help but notice Yves gave her the table with the best natural light, making the conditions ideal for photography editing and her heart grows two sized just thinking about it.  
It doesn’t take long for her attention to be drawn to Yves again, though: she watches her friend sway with the music behind the counter while she cleans up some mugs and Jiwoo suddenly wishes she had her camera to capture the scene in front of her.

Yves had been Jiwoo’s almost exclusive photography subject when she had moved in the dorm: she had been fascinated by her from day one; by her smile and her little frown when she wrote and the gracious way she moved around the rooms. She had stopped abruptly when she had first noticed the way her heart fluttered around Yves.

Jiwoo’s teacher always say her photographies’ best quality is how much they reveal about her; how connected with her feelings she is when she takes a picture. Taking pictures of Yves is dangerous because Jiwoo knows she would pour too many feelings in them, would reveal her heart’s true nature. ‘Dipped you inside my white heart, and made it red’ as had written Yves in her first ever published song. Jiwoo often finds about it, wondering who inspired her those words. She knows they convey perfectly her own feelings, though, and it scares her to the core.

She’s still lost in her thoughts when Yves slides in the chair in front of her and pushes a slice of strawberry pie and an iced coffee in front of her.

“I don’t have any money!” Jiwoo protests.

“It’s on me,” Yves smiles. “I asked the chef for strawberry pie for you today. He said it wasn’t the season but,” She waves vaguely in the tart’s direction, as to indicate ‘there it is!’. “I like watching you eat.” Jiwoo feels her cheeks heating up.

“Can I take a picture first?”

“It wouldn’t be you if you didn’t.”

She takes a dozen pictures instead of one, several angles until she’s totally happy with the result and shows it off to Yves who grins in answer. The pie is good, as is the coffee but it might have more to do with the fact that it’s a gift from Yves than anything else.

“Does anyone else know you work here?”

“Jinsoulie, Haseul and Vivi have known since day one. I brought Olivia one day because she was sad and I didn’t wanted to leave her alone.”

“But you didn’t tell me,” Jiwoo doesn’t want to sound angry or accusatory but she’s a little hurt Yves would keep such a thing from her.

“Ah,” Yves scratches her nose, looking a bit sheepish. “It’s because I took that job to help pay your last birthday present at first. I didn’t wanted to blow the surprise but…” She laughs a little, looking up at the ceiling. “Camera lenses really are expensive, uh? Since I liked the atmosphere I ended up keeping the job even after I could pay for it. It’s nice sometimes to have some extra cash to spoil yourself with.”

“You took an extra job… To pay for my birthday gift?” Yves shrugs.

“I love watching you take photographies,” Says Yves with a slow smile. “It was worth it.”

The air is puched out of her. “I love you,” Jiwoo answers before she has time to think. She freezes then, her spoonful of strawberry pie suspended between the plate and her mouth. She blinks (once, twice.). Yves hasn’t disappeared. Yves is still here, and she’s still smiling like she knows a delightful secret. She takes the spoon from Jiwoo’s hand and direct it to her lips. Jiwoo eats entirely on reflex, her stomach reduced to nervous knots.

“I love you too, Jiwoo,” Yves says, leaning over the table. She puts one hand on Jiwoo’s cheek, soft like a dream, and she kisses her. “You taste so sweet.”

“You too, now,” Jiwoo says a little stupidly. Yves smiles so big Jiwoo thinks she might collapse from the sheer intensity of it, from the force of her love.

“Let’s always taste like each other from now on, okay?”

Jiwoo nods, dumbly. Yves stands to go back to work, turns around when Jiwoo calls her name. Smiles at the phone pointed in her direction. For the first time in two years, Jiwoo takes a picture of Yves. It’s a little blurry and the light is slightly off; there’s an old man drinking a very tall pink beverage in the background. Yves is smiling in the middle of it, bright and still a mystery. It might be the best picture Jiwoo has ever taken in her life.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't usually write things in a day like that but eh... Inspiration. My legs hurt. Don't hesitate to leave a comment here or to come say hi on [my blog!](https://sweetchoerrylove.tumblr.com/)


End file.
